Grant County herald. [volume] (Lancaster, Wis.) 1850-1968, 1887-07-07
Ingersoll,s Trihute To Reecher.

Win very narrow ana closely grated
windows. Under its walls were the
rayless, dopeless and measureless dun
geons of the damned, and on its roof
fell the shadow of Gods eternal frown.
In this prison the creed and catechism
were primers for children, and from
pure sense of duty their loving hearts
were stained and SCARED with the re-
ligion of John Calvin.
In those days the home of an orthodox
minister was an inquisition in which
babes were tortured for the good of
their souls. Children then, as now,
rebelled against the infamous absurdi-
ties and cruelties of the creed. No
Calvinist was ever able, unless with
blows, to answer the questions of his
child. Children were raised in what
was called 1.-The nurture and admonition
of the Lord''-thatis to say, their wills
were broken or subdued. their natures
deformed and dwarfed, their desires
defeated or destroyed, and their de-
velopment arrested or perverted. Life
was robbed of its spring, its summer
and its autumn. Children stepped from
the cradle into the snow. No laughter,
no sunshine. no joyous, free. unbur-
dened days. God, an infinite detective,
watched them from above, and Satan,
with malicious leer, was waiting for
their souls below. Between these mon
sters life was passed. Infinite conse-
quences were predicated OF the smallest
action. and burden greater than god
could bear was placed upon the heart
and brain of every child. To think, to
ask questions, to doubt, to investigate,
were acts of rebellion. To express pity
for the lost writhing in the dungeons
below, was simply to give evidence that
the enemy of souls had been at work
within their hearts.
Among all the religions of this world
from the creed of Cannibals who de-
voured flesh to that of Calvinists who
polluted souls-there is none, there has
been none, there will be none more ut
terly heartless and inhuman than was the
orthodox Congregationalism of New
England in the year of grace 1918. 1t
despised every natural joy, hated pic
lures, abhorred statues as lewd and
lustful things, execrated music, re-
garded nature as fallen and corrupt,
man as totally depraved. and women as
somewhat worse. The theater was the
vestibule Of perdition, actors the SER
wants of Satan, and Shakespeare tr1fling
wretch, whose words were seeds of
death. And yet the virtues found well
come, cordial and sincrere; duty was
done as understood; obligations were
discharged; truth was told; selfdenial
was practiced for the sake of others; and
hearts were good and true in spite of
book and creed
In this atmosphere of theological MAS
ma, in this hideous dream of supersti-
ton. in this penitentiary, moral and
austere this babe first saw the imprisoned
gloom.
The natural desires ungratified, the
laughter suppressed, the logic brow
beaten by authority, the humor frozen
by fear-of many generations-were in
this child, child destined to rend and
wreck the PRISONS walls.
Through the grated window of his
cell this child, this boy, this man caught
glimpses of the outer world, of fields
and skies. New thoughts were in his brain,
new hopes within his heart. Another
heaven bent above his life. There came
revelation of the beautiful and real.
Theology grew mean and small.
Nature wooed and won and saved
this mighty soul.
Her countless hands were sowing
seeds within his tropic brain. All sights
and sounds-all colors, forms and frag-
ments were stored within the treasury
of his mind. His thoughts were mould
ed by the graceful curves of streams,
by winding paths in woods, the charm
of quiet country roads, and lanes grown
indistinct with weeds and grass-by vines
that cling and hide with leaf and flower
the crumbling wallis decay-by cattle
standing in the summer pools like stat
ues of content.
There was within his words the subtle
spirit of the seasons change-of every
thing that is, of every thing that lies be-
tween the slumbering seeds, that half
awakened by the April rain, have dreams
of heavens blue and feel the amorous
kisses of the sun, and that strange tomb
wherein the alchemist doth give to
deaths cold dust the throb and thrill of
life again.
He saw with loving eyes the willows
of the meadow-streams grow red beneath
the glance of spring-the grass along
the marsh's edge-the stir of life be-
meath the withered leaves-the moss be-
low the drip of snow-the flowers that
give their bosoms to the first south
wind that woos-the sad and timid violets
that only bear the gaze OF love from
eyes half closed-the ferns, where fancy
gives thousand forms with but single
plan the green and sunny slopes en-
riched with daisy's silver and the cow
slips gold.
As in the leahess woods some tree
afame with life stands like rapt poet
in the needless crowd, so stood this man
among his fellow-men.
All there is of leaf and bud, of flower
and fruit, of painted insect life, and all
the winged and happy children of the.
air that summer holds beneath her dome
of blue were known and loved by him.
He loved the yellow autumn fields,
the golden stacks, the happy homes of
men. the orchards bending boughs, the
the sumach's flags of flame, the naples
with TRANSPORTED leaves, the tender yell
low of the beech, the wondrous har-
monies of brown and gold the vines